67 pages • 2 hours read
Laura McBrideWe Are Called to Rise
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2014A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 1-3Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 1 Summary: “Avis”
The story begins with Avis as narrator. Avis is a Las Vegas housewife who has been married for 29 years but has hit a rough patch with her distant husband, Jim. We learn that she had a tough upbringing in Vegas with her mother, Sharlene, who was unstable and irresponsible. Avis wants to rekindle her passion and save her dwindling marriage. She gets out of bed, opens her underwear drawer, and is shocked to find a handgun there. She remembers when Jim gave her the gun for self-defense, back when Avis had just given birth to their daughter, Emily. Though caught off guard by the pistol, she undresses to signal her intimate intentions with Jim. He then declares he is seeing another woman, Darcy—a much younger coworker. Avis is stunned at his unexpected confession.
Memories about her family begin to rush in. She thinks about her daughter, Emily, her son, Nate, and her mother, Sharlene, who warned Avis never to trust a man. Her mind unravels with scattered thoughts, beginning with how she has become afraid of her own son since his return from the war in Iraq. She then flashes back to when Sharlene asked her to babysit Rodney, Avis’s younger brother, whom she raised. Avis alludes to Sharlene’s immaturity, a “27-year-old…[who] loves peanut butter and banana sandwiches” (11). In another memory, Avis recounts how she met Jim: She was 21 and working at a casino. She was attractive and regularly courted by men, but Jim’s sincerity and persistence wooed her.
Avis stares at the gun while Jim continues to explain himself. She doesn’t respond but keeps wondering how the gun got there. She returns to her memories, this time thinking about living in a car with Sharlene, Rodney, and a man named Steve. They lived on the road for a year, dodging authorities and barely surviving, since Steve was a lowlife who had robbed a casino. Avis recalls how grateful she felt when her mother finally left Steve.
The gun in front of her brings Avis back to reality. She asks Jim why it’s there, and he seems caught off guard, telling her it’s not loaded. Avis checks to see if this is true, which makes Jim nervous. She keeps imagining her broken life as a child and holds the gun. Then, she remembers when their daughter Emily was a baby and Jim took them all to get ice cream. She recalls how Emily became inexplicably sick that day and how they rushed her to the ER. We learn that Emily died that day.
Jim interrupts her thoughts by trying to console Avis about his affair. Avis is thinking about their son, about Emily, and about her family’s future. Reluctantly, she breaks down crying, and Jim holds her.
Chapter 2 Summary: “Roberta”
Roberta grew up in a Jewish family in Las Vegas, after they left New York to pursue a better life in Nevada. She recalls her easy childhood attending local public schools and living “in a small town filled with big dreamers” (19). She is nostalgic about her father’s success: He owned an electric company and provided a luxurious life for her family in the 1980s. Roberta emphasizes that her family lived in a sheltered happiness, but other neighbors and classmates weren’t as fortunate.
She declares that it’s not the kids who grow up in Sin City who are obsessed with its dark side, but those who move there or visit from other places. She talks about how homey and neighborly Vegas is, and says that many people actually live conservative, suburban lives. Eventually, some begin to work at the casinos and restaurants or move away to attend college, while many enlist in the Armed Forces, since recruitment centers are commonplace off the Strip. She highlights the military culture in Vegas and the sense of American righteousness and patriotism, which she is critical of, especially when it preys on those who aren’t fortunate enough to make decisions about their own future. Roberta is concerned with social equity; in her “line of work” (23), she worries about those who don’t have fair opportunities.
Chapter 3 Summary: “Bashkim”
Bashkim is an elementary school student from Albania who loves to follow the rules. He is scared to disobey the adults at his school, even the crosswalk helpers, who tell him not to step off the curb until they say so. He expresses fear of being “reported to the principal” (24), because this would require a parent conference, and his “baba” would make a scene. He mentions that baba (his father) would also punish him if Bashkim were to get in trouble at school. Overall, Bashkim is happy to attend school and speaks highly of the Italian immigrant, Mr. Ernie, who helps him cross the street every day. His “Nene” (mother) lets him eat ice cream cones for breakfast, and he enjoys that she keeps this a secret from baba.
At school, Bashkim’s third-grade teacher, Mrs. Monaghan, is a “new teacher that nobody wanted,” though he thinks she is “pretty good” (27). He explains how she runs her class with organization and discipline, as well as love. She is Australian, and he thinks her accent is funny, comparing it to his own Albanian accent. Bashkim enjoys school and describes how everything operates, emphasizing how well-behaved and quiet most students are, which he appreciates. He fantasizes about reaching fifth grade so that he can help the younger students. He mentions his baby sister, Tirana, and wishes he could take home a kitten from his class to keep his sister and his mother happy—though he knows his father would not approve.
Bashkim knows that his parents had a difficult life in Albania, explaining how his Baba “saw slaughters in Albania” (33). He also shares that because of his father’s dark past, Baba abuses Nene, even though she doesn’t deserve it. In Albania, Bashkim’s father got into a scuffle with a police officer and went to prison, and when he got out after 19 years, he met Bashkim’s mother. They were forced into an arranged marriage, and Baba does not allow Nene to make any decisions.
Chapters 1-3 Analysis
The contrasts among these three characters’ lives reveal the diverse range of American experiences and opportunities that exist—from the wealthy lifestyles of the rich and comfortable to the hardships of immigrants and poor Americans. The idea of the American Dream is central to the text, as it establishes Las Vegas as a symbol for how everyone wants to pursue a better life and risk their luck by taking a gamble on happiness. Though many outsiders see Las Vegas as a place of sin, it has become a haven for others, including the three characters who narrate these chapters.
Avis overcame a traumatic history of poverty in Las Vegas to create a happy life for herself—only to watch it unravel with Jim’s affair and Nate’s post-war struggles. She has worked diligently as a wife and mother but fears that she is no better than her own mother, Sharlene, who was neglectful and irresponsible. Though she has seemingly taken every step to have a happy and healthy marriage, her destiny is ultimately out of her control, and she struggles to make sense of it all:
[I]t seemed suddenly that all of that, all of those emotions and all of that pretending, just came rushing toward me, a torpedo of shame and failure and fear. Jim was in love with Darcy. My son had come back from Iraq a different man. My crazy mother had been right. And my whole life, how hard I had tried, had come to this (9).
She feels foolish for having believed that she could achieve stability despite her troubled past. Though she attained the American Dream, it was only temporary, and she must rebuild herself from her losses.
Roberta, on the other hand, has lived happily and comfortably in Las Vegas. In contrast to Avis’s life, her memories of Las Vegas are filled with nostalgia and wealth. Though we don’t know much about Roberta’s personal life at this point, she is dedicated to helping others and providing a pathway to the American Dream for the less fortunate. From a young age, she was aware of the reality that she lived in a bubble: “I remember the way other kids lived. Back then, there wasn’t much space between the best parts of Vegas and the worst” (21). Whereas Avis wants the conventional simplicity of a stable family life—having never previously had it—Roberta is acutely aware of systemic inequalities and is committed to social justice, even at the expense of her own family’s happiness, which she barely mentions in the opening chapter. She is focused on the big picture rather than her own situation. Her compassion and thoughtful attitude are established early on, revealing her as a protagonist who will sacrifice herself to defend others.
Finally, Bashkim represents another layer of the American Dream as the son of poor Albanian immigrants. There is a clear tonal shift in his chapter; he is an innocent and disciplined child whose family is dictated by his Baba—an angry man with a troubled history in his native country: “I know all about slaughters. My baba saw slaughters in Albania. That’s why he hits my Nene and makes bad noises at night” (33). Bashkim is more mature than his age suggests and has had to grow up fast as an immigrant child. His desire for order and obedience is evident in how he operates at school, where he enjoys following directions and making his teachers happy. He alludes to an abusive household, making comments such as “sometimes I have to be real quiet at home, and that’s a scary quiet, but being quiet at school is not like that. Being quiet is just something Orson Hulet Elementary School kids do” (29). His desire for structure emphasizes his lack of support at home.
The opening chapters begin to establish each character’s vastly different lives but also how they occupy the same city, offering insight into the modern realities that overlap in many American lives, even when least expected.
